…Animals are constantly asking us in their own ways to treat them better or leave them alone. What might their manifesto look like? Basically, animals want to be treated better or left alone, and they`re fully justified in making this request. We must stop ignoring their gaze and closing our hearts to their pleas. We can easily do what they ask -- to stop causing them unnecessary pain, suffering, loneliness, sadness, and death, even extinction. It`s a matter of making different choices: about how we conduct research, about how we entertain ourselves, about what we buy, where we live, who we eat, who we wear, and even family planning.…

Here are six reasons for expanding our compassion footprint:

All animals share the earth and we must coexsist
Animals think and feel
Animals have and deserve compassion
Connection breeds caring, alienation breeds disrespect
Our world is not compassionate to animals
Acting compassionately helps all beings and our world

…Marc Bekoff is professor emeritus of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at CU, Boulder, and scholar-in-residence at the University of Denver`s Institute for Human-Animal Connection. He will be speaking at the Boulder Bookstore about his new book, "The Animal Manifesto: Six Reasons For Expanding Our Compassion Footprint," today at 7:30 p.m.